Wings Poem by Mary Champion

Ancient man - tied to the earth - scanned the skies
and marvelled at the soaring birds, who flew
unfettered; somehow breaking all the ties.
He longed to share their mystic freedom too.
Saw bats and ants and butterflies and bees
take flight, enabled by the gift of wings.
Restless, envious Man sank to his knees
and prayed to unseen gods to grant these things.

The deities, as ever, gave no heed,
so, we, anxious to make them hear our cries,
spawned gods who would embody all we'd need
to grant us freedom of the endless skies.
Hermes, Nike and the wild Valkyrie;
Ahura Mazda, Isis and Horus;
Quetzalcoatl and swift Mercury -
all these and more joined our wingéd chorus.

But still the gift of flight eluded us.
So, we created myths adorned with wings;
Greeks told of Icarus and Pegasus,
dragons flew in dark imaginings.
Divinely sanctioned angels ruled the sky,
as gossamer winged fairies fluttered past,
while witches mounted broomsticks to defy
the law of gravity that held us fast.

 
The master, Leonardo, longed to glide
above the Earth on wings that he'd divined.
But in the end his hopes of flying died.
No source of motive power could he find.
Then, as the twentieth century began,
two brothers broke the barriers and flew.
For we have hidden wings, unique to Man:
our dreams and hands to make them all come true.